He stood before the door for what felt like an eternity, his hand hovering inches from the handle as though it weighed far more than metal ever could. The mere act of touching it had become a trial, a mountain to climb. Memories roared through him in silent storms—fragments of her laughter, the way she would tilt her head when listening, the warmth that once made the world a safe place.
She had not brought him into this world, not by blood. Yet, to him, she had been nothing less than a mother.
With a slow, uneven breath, he gathered the scattered pieces of himself. His appearance spoke volumes—clothes wrinkled and stale from a night spent in his brother's room, hair disheveled, eyes swollen. There had never been a need to look presentable for her—not today, not ever. She had always seen him, even at his worst.
The hinges gave a faint sigh as he pushed the door open. Inside, the air was still, unnervingly so. He moved toward the bed, each step measured, reluctant. Her body lay there as if only sleeping, the doctor's careful work preserving her from decay, trapping her in a cruel imitation of life.
He reached out, and his fingers closed around her hand—cold, unnaturally cold, the blue of her skin replacing the warmth that had once cupped his cheeks and played gently with his hair when he was small.
Tears came without bidding, blurring the edges of the room. His green eyes—once bright with the reckless light of youth—now brimmed with grief, becoming a sea that spilled over.
He sank to his knees beside her, his forehead resting in the hollow of her palm, as though her touch might return, as though the universe could be bargained with.
"Mama…" The word cracked in his throat. "Please… wake up. Please, I can't— I can't do this. Your son is here… why won't you open your eyes? It hurts so much, it feels like my heart will tear itself apart…"
His voice faltered into silence. He climbed onto the bed, curling against her the way he had in childhood, pressing his face into the faint scent of her, as if by staying there—close enough to hear her nonexistent heartbeat—he might keep her from leaving altogether.
"Mama… please… Leon and I—we need you. And Amy… little Amelia barely got to know you. Is this how you'll leave us? Without even a goodbye?"
The words trembled out of Matthew, his voice breaking against the wall of silence between them. The stillness of the room was suffocating, the air thick with the kind of quiet that follows a terrible truth. He had been speaking to her body, yet some part of him still believed she could hear, that she might stir, that the faintest twitch of her lips would undo this nightmare.
A sound rose then—fragile at first, then raw—a desperate sob that didn't belong to him. Matthew's head lifted, and across the bed, Leon stood. His eyes, red-rimmed and glistening, were drowning in tears he tried and failed to hold back. His mouth trembled with the effort of swallowing grief, but when his control broke, it shattered completely.
In two unsteady steps, Leon collapsed forward, his body folding over their mother's still form.
"Mom… why? Why did you leave us? Now—now, when we're finally all together again… you're gone. I know I was trouble, I know I wasn't the best son… but I tried, I really did. Please… why this silent departure? Why without even a farewell?"
Matthew's chest constricted at his brother's words, each one piercing him like splinters. Slowly, as though every movement was weighed down by lead, he rose and circled the bed. Without a word, he bent down and pulled Leon into his arms.
It might have been the first time they'd embraced like this—not as boys wrestling in play, not in passing as brothers, but as two sons clinging to each other in the wreckage of loss. Leon's arms locked around him in return, desperate, crushing. He buried his face into Matthew's chest, and together they broke—sobbing, shaking, the sound raw enough to scrape the air from the walls.
Neither of them noticed the quiet figures standing just outside the doorway. Olivia and Isabella lingered there, unseen witnesses to the storm inside. Isabella's hands rose to her mouth, as though to trap the sobs struggling to escape her. But her tears defied her, slipping hot and fast down her cheeks.
Olivia turned toward her, pulling her into a steady embrace. She rested a hand against Isabella's back, her voice low, steadying.
"Breathe. We have to be their support, not add to the weight they're already carrying. Gather yourself. We'll leave them to their grief, let them have this moment in peace."
Isabella's breath shuddered, and she nodded, brushing at her tears with trembling fingers.
"You're right… let's go. Let them mourn their mother… without us intruding."
And so they slipped away, leaving behind the room that had become a sanctuary of sorrow—a place where two brothers held onto each other as if that was the only way to survive the empty space their mother's absence had carved into the world.
Barely an hour had passed since they had left the suffocating quiet of the bedroom and shut themselves inside Matthew's study. The earlier storm of tears felt almost unreal now—like some sudden summer downpour that floods the streets, only to vanish under the heat, leaving behind cracked ground and the faint smell of rain. If that breakdown had been a release, a purging of the grief they had locked away for years, then now was the burying—covering it over and returning, or at least pretending to return, to the business of the living.
They sat facing one another: four figures, the tension between them sharp enough to cut. Matthew's glare burned across the desk, his jaw clenched, his voice low but trembling with rage.
"Have you lost your mind, Leon? You poisoned your own sister—your flesh and blood! Have you completely lost all sense?"
Leon didn't flinch, but his eyes slid away, fixed somewhere over Matthew's shoulder as though the grain of the wooden wall was suddenly fascinating.
"Well," he said, almost lazily, "there wasn't another way. And besides—why am I the only one being dragged over the coals? Let's not forget it was your wife's idea. Maybe you should take it up with her."
Across the table, Olivia's patience frayed in the silence that followed. Her mind seethed with curses she swallowed back, her expression schooled into something almost calm. This bastard… shifting his mess onto me? She took a deep breath before speaking, her voice smooth but edged.
"It was just a mild dose. It won't harm her. You're all acting as if I've murdered someone. I have the antidote—she'll wake by this afternoon and remember nothing."
Leon's mouth curled into something between a smirk and a sneer.
Mathieu responded
"Oh, do shut up. I've no interest in hearing another word of your lunacy. Do you think everyone enjoys playing with poisons as much as you do?"
Olivia's eyes flashed, her composure splintering.
"Lunacy? And who exactly are you calling insane?"
he snapped back, spitting the word as if to keep her at a distance. "Or have you forgotten your place, Olivia? You've already set my brothers against one another. I may have no intention of punishing you—yet—but my patience has its limits."
The air in the study thickened, heavy with the unspoken—resentment, accusation, and the raw echo of grief that none of them wanted to name. Somewhere beneath it all, the truth lay coiled and waiting, ready to strike when the next word crossed the line.
"Oh? Patience has its limits, does it?" Olivia's voice was low, the kind of softness that only made the blade underneath sharper. She leaned back in her chair, eyes fixed on Leon with a predator's stillness. "You speak as though you hold the keys to every locked door. Then by all means—enlighten me. What brilliant solution would you have offered, had I not taken the matter into my own hands?"
Matthias's lips parted, but no answer came at first. He faltered, searching for a defense, for anything to cut through her challenge. His gaze dropped, buying time, until he muttered,
"You could have just… asked her. I doubt she would have refused to help Layla."
Olivia laughed once, short and mirthless, the sound more like the snap of a whip than amusement. "Ah, remarkable. Truly, I'm humbled by your genius. You think that witch would help me—help her own daughter—after the way she spat her venom at me last night? She'd sooner throw herself from the highest tower than grant me what I needed. No, dear Matthias … you should be thanking me."
Across from them, leon and Isabella sat in uneasy silence, their eyes darting between the two combatants. They had seen Olivia and Matthias exchange barbs before—plenty of times, in fact—but never like this. Not in front of them. Not with such a sharp edge that it felt as though the air in the study itself might split open.
The tense air was punctured by a knock at the door. Three crisp raps, polite but firm.
"Enter," Matthew called, his voice carrying the authority of the room's master.
The door opened to reveal the head butler, ushering in a young woman who lingered just behind him. She curtsied quickly.
"Your Grace, Your Ladyship. My Lord Marquis. My Lady Marquess," she greeted, her voice careful, formal. "My lady, I have completed my work."
Olivia's eyes slid to the butler. "See that she's paid what she's due," she said lightly, as though the simmering quarrel from moments ago had been a different lifetime.
The maid stepped aside, revealing the figure behind her—Talia.
The moment she entered, Leon's and Matthew's eyes widened in unison. It was as if a ghost had walked into the room—their mother's ghost. The same hair, swept back in the exact style she had always worn. The same eyes, even down to the faint glimmer of something that might have been kindness or judgment, depending on how they remembered her.
Without hesitation, Matthew moved toward her, his steps urgent.
Olivia's hand shot out, her fingers circling his wrist like a shackle.
"That's Talia," she said firmly, holding his gaze. "What do you think you're doing?"
She knew, of course. She had seen the flicker in his eyes, the crack in his composure. For an instant, he had believed.
Matthew's mouth opened, then closed again. He looked away, his voice unsteady. "Ah… nothing. It's nothing."
The silence that followed felt colder than before, the air heavy with unspoken things. Olivia rose from her chair, crossing the short distance to Talia. She let her fingers brush lightly through the styled hair, inspecting the work with a critical eye.
"This should suffice," she said after a moment. "He's done well."
But before she could say more, Matthew's voice cut through the space—calm, controlled, and edged with command.
"Everyone, leave us. I have matters to discuss with Lady Talia."
There was no hesitation in his tone, no invitation for debate. One by one, they obeyed—Olivia first, then Leon, and finally Isabella—until only Matthew and the woman who so resembled the dead remained in the study's heavy quiet.